Warning if buying games and VAC banned.

[CTRL ALT DEL !]

Please warn players that are considering buying a game on a VAC banned account that they are likely to receive abuse and bans from servers even if they don't cheat any more.

So many people are so annoyed with cheats that they go out of there way to abuse them and get them banned from as many servers as possible.

This makes multiplayer games often unusable by the banned player.

After VAC status was made public on accounts, such warnings should have been put in place.

"Warning, You have VAC bans on record and will likely receive in-game abuse for playing on a banned account, We recommend you create a new account to buy games on and only use this account to play single-player games associated with it."

I honestly feel sorry for the people that purchased games on a banned account, not knowing Valve would make the bans on the account public. You can be sure they wouldn't have spent hundreds of dollars on this accounts had they know the bans would be made public.

Valve should allow those that didn't cheat after the original infraction and purchased games without getting further bans, to transfer the games they purchased after the ban to another account or remove the banned games from that account, this should be a once off amnesty for those that were caught out with the publishing of VAC status.

You may say but they cheated, no they didn't not after that once or there would be no amnesty. This is only for those that cheated once only before VAC status was made public and for the games they purchased after the ban, all games owned previous to the ban would be removed, leaving only those purchased after the ban.

What it does is mimics purchasing a new account when they got banned, the only reason they didn't was they could not predict Valve releasing VAC status and where willing to accept the life ban for cheating.

Those that didn't accept a life ban repurchased the game and don't have bans on record. Please consider this people were often very young when they cheated the once.

[Pony4Lief]

They deserve it.

/thread

[CTRL ALT DEL !]

Originally Posted by Pony4Lief

They deserve it.

/thread

Are you aware that almost all serial cheaters buy 1 game per account and never have to have ban(s) on record.

The only people ban(s) affect are those that don't intend to cheat and buy all their games on one account. They get highjacked and someone else cheats on their account or where young and silly enough not to know they would get banned using what they did.

The people we all really want banned and to abuse are serial cheats that use the one game per account, but like I said before they get away scott free and those that aren't serial cheaters get abused the most by the community and banned from servers in games they never cheated in.

I am not saying unban them, I am saying the flag on accounts to show bans on record causes abuse and should be either removed or more info given.

eg the year of the last ban and the games banned from should be added or the entire thing removed.

I do not approve of cheating, but I don't support abuse either and this causes abuse.

[Wardiaper]

I'm torn. I understand what you are saying about someone spending more money on games and then VAC ban later showing up on their profile, but at the same time to paint them as a helpless victim who is being abused by honest players - I can't get my brain to really feel sorry for them.

Games are not a necessary part of life, playing games is not a right. It is a privilege that when abused should be dealt with. Driving is a privilege that you can lose through abuse, not a right. The helpless victims who are being abused every single day are the honest players who paid their money and have to tolerate cheaters and hope the system can deal with them effectively.

There is a way for these people to lose that VAC ban status - start a new clean account and buy new games. Getting your driving privilege back should be so easy.

EDIT - The original account doesn't even have to be abandoned. Just buy the multiplayer games you want to play on the new clean account that you don't want people to know you were VAC banned. That may only be a few games and not replacing every game in your old account.

[CTRL ALT DEL !]

Originally Posted by Wardiaper

I'm torn. I understand what you are saying about someone spending more money on games and then VAC ban later showing up on their profile, but at the same time to paint them as a helpless victim who is being abused by honest players - I can't get my brain to really feel sorry for them.

Games are not a necessary part of life, playing games is not a right. It is a privilege that when abused should be dealt with. Driving is a privilege that you can lose through abuse, not a right. The helpless victims who are being abused every single day are the honest players who paid their money and have to tolerate cheaters and hope the system can deal with them effectively.

There is a way for these people to lose that VAC ban status - start a new clean account and buy new games. Getting your driving privilege back should be so easy.

They should at least warn people that are buying games on a VAC banned account. I know it's hard to feel sorry for someone that cheated. But give this a try.

Not saying this has happened but it can right now:

1. Joe buys a game and plays for a few weeks and gets bored and doesn't play.
2. John his little brother asks if he can play and Joe says sure.
3. John gets annoyed at all the cheaters and decides to cheat himself to get even, he does and discovers cheating is very boring as there is no skill required and he stops playing the game before there is any ban on record.

4. Joe see's a cool new game released and checks out the store.

5. There is a sale and Joe goes wild and spends $200 and gets $1000 worth of games.

6. The next day Joe joins a server in a new game he just got and gets banned immediately on joining the server. This happens to him a lot.

7. He has people contact him on friends calling him a cheat and abusing him.

8. Joe finally clicks on his community page, which isn't even set up, because he didn't know how and see's ban(s) on record.

9. he assumes this is from getting banned on the servers he was in and continues playing and being abused and nobody wants to be his friend on community

10. Someone finally explains to him what a VAC ban is and why he is getting abused or he reads about it or finds his way to this forum.

11. He is annoyed as hell that he spent a heap of money on an account that will always attract abuse.

12. He can do nothing but rebuy all those games again and that is why there should be a warning if you do have bans.

[Captain Morti]

Or in that scenario it could also be: Hes angry about the situation and quits to play games on steam, because "steam ruined his new games for him". So steam loses a customer who otherwise would buy games.

[Wardiaper]

You could lose cheating players or you could lose the honest players who are sick and tired of cheaters and quit buying games. I guess if it's a numbers game then whichever population is bigger will win. Who buys more games - cheaters or honest players?

I would be okay with having a warning about buying new games for the VAC banned accounts. In an ideal world those accounts would be closed anyway

[Captain Morti]

You could lose cheating players or you could lose the honest players who are sick and tired of cheaters and quit buying games. I guess if it's a numbers game then whichever population is bigger will win. Who buys more games - cheaters or honest players?

Why should a nonVAC-banned user stop buying games when other users get a special warning (2 sentences in an orange font)? I mean he's not affected by it at all.

[Wardiaper]

Originally Posted by Captain Morti

Why should a nonVAC-banned user stop buying games when other users get a special warning (2 sentences in an orange font)? I mean he's not affected by it at all.

I'm fine with a warning about buying new games on a VAC-banned account.

Just the talk about the guy with the banned account gets angry and quits buying games - so what, who cares, shouldn't even be a consideration for Valve. Start a new account and/or move along. In the example above, Joe needs to tell John that cheating means his account is destroyed. If John is not old enough to understand that, I doubt that he is old enough to know how to install the cheats to begin with.

My ideal warning on a VAC-banned account purchase would read something like this -

"This purchase cannot be completed on a VAC-banned account. Please create a new account and retry your purchase. Your business is important to us, Valve."

You wouldn't lose access to the account - just no new purchases could be made for that account.

[exoriority]

Originally Posted by CTRL ALT DEL !

They should at least warn people that are buying games on a VAC banned account. I know it's hard to feel sorry for someone that cheated. But give this a try.

Not saying this has happened but it can right now:

1. Joe buys a game and plays for a few weeks and gets bored and doesn't play.
2. John his little brother asks if he can play and Joe says sure.
3. John gets annoyed at all the cheaters and decides to cheat himself to get even, he does and discovers cheating is very boring as there is no skill required and he stops playing the game before there is any ban on record.

4. Joe see's a cool new game released and checks out the store.

5. There is a sale and Joe goes wild and spends $200 and gets $1000 worth of games.

6. The next day Joe joins a server in a new game he just got and gets banned immediately on joining the server. This happens to him a lot.

7. He has people contact him on friends calling him a cheat and abusing him.

8. Joe finally clicks on his community page, which isn't even set up, because he didn't know how and see's ban(s) on record.

9. he assumes this is from getting banned on the servers he was in and continues playing and being abused and nobody wants to be his friend on community

10. Someone finally explains to him what a VAC ban is and why he is getting abused or he reads about it or finds his way to this forum.

11. He is annoyed as hell that he spent a heap of money on an account that will always attract abuse.

12. He can do nothing but rebuy all those games again and that is why there should be a warning if you do have bans.

I don't support cheat myself, but yeah I can see your point.

So if someone got VAC banned, the punishment of not getting the ban lifted forever is harsh enough, but keeping raking their money regardless whether they would enjoy it or not is kind of way over the line.

The similar thing occur on buying packs, when you have a game/DLCs on a pack steam doesn't warn you that you already have some of the item on the pack. Thus, you usually end up buying some things TWICE, but you only get the item ONCE.

There won't be gift copy of the item or whatsoever, just the overprced game right there in your library laughing at you. On this one, steam punishes legit players/buyers, for what? shopping on the store?

Steam's policy is a bit warped on couple of the edges, and usually DON'T favor their customers.

Nevertheless, cheaters on MP games... what a ♥♥♥♥ing lowlifes. What good will it do? bragging rights? Stats? It doesn't do you any good IRL. But yeah, I agree, a warning would be good.

Permanent VAC ban and account tagging is more than enough... keep sucking their hard earned money, however, is unethical IMHO. They didn't hurt anyone IRL, nor robbing someone's house, or whatever serious crime happen out there. They cheat in games, virtual world.

[Senescence]

Originally Posted by CTRL ALT DEL !

They should at least warn people that are buying games on a VAC banned account. I know it's hard to feel sorry for someone that blah blah blah blah........

Maybe little joey should sue valve

Also, many cheaters dont get caught.

[Captain Morti]

Originally Posted by Senescence

Maybe little joey should sue valve

He cant, he agreed to not sue Valve with the SSA.

[sniperkiller266]

no wonder Valve made ton of money

[Wardiaper]

Actually, a warning about buying new games might not work so well. The VAC ban could come weeks after the cheating happened. In the meantime all purchases would not have a warning.

The moral of the story - Be a responsible cheater.

[CTRL ALT DEL !]

If they implemented it only people with bans would ever see it, so it's a non issue for other players.

Blocking game purchases is a bad idea, what if someone only plays single player games on easy because they are a really bad player and got 1 multi player in a game in a pack because the games he wanted where in the pack. That sort of person might just play multiplayer and use a cheat to balance the field so to speak. Blocking them from adding more single player games would be pointless and they would not care at all about having a ban as they don't intend to even buy multiplayer games or get involved in a community.

You have to remember there are many different types of players and many reasons for cheating.

Here are some reasons I have been given for cheating:

I hated the game and wanted to get banned.

Everyone else was cheating.

I just wanted to be average.

I couldn't get in a clan.

I didn't think that was cheating.

I had a really crap PC.

It isn't very often people just cheat to make people rage, mostly they want to be accepted, many probably have mental health issues and can't cope with being below average and have a need to be better.

I have talked many times about cheating and why people do, but mostly they feel unwanted and left out, so they cheat and some people think they are great, they get to join clans and play matches and are a part of the community. Then they get banned, they have 2 options cheat again for instant gratification or practice for years, most of those cheat again many times before they learn and some never do.